Thomas Kekeisen, CEO of the German startup Socialbit, bought a MakerBot Replicator 2 Desktop 3D Printer in January 2013. He had no concrete idea of what he would print with it, but knew he would use the opportunity to build a company culture around creativity. “For me and my employees,” says Thomas, “the MakerBot is a great possibility to live our creativity.”

Since the MakerBot arrived, Thomas has used it to create everything from beer holders to a hot sauce dispenser to a bicycle storage system for an iPhone 5 with an external battery pack.

Want to share your own MakerBot Replicator 2 story for a chance to win $250? Find out how here.

Airing this Tuesday, June 18, on NPR’s All Tech Considered  and on NPR.org’s website, will be a feature on Robohand, the amazing story of a mechanical hand printed with a MakerBot Replicator 2 Desktop 3D Printer. The hand was designed for those who have lost or were born without fingers. The original concept and design was created by a two-man team separated by 10,000 miles: Ivan Owen, a prop master from Washington State, and Richard Van As, a master carpenter from Johannesburg, South Africa.

As part of the Robohand Project, one of MakerBot’s lead designers, Michael Curry, worked with Rich and Ivan to refine the assembly instructions. Together, they were able to make the assembly easier and make a derivative Robohand almost entirely 3D printed without hardware.  While Michael’s snap-together version might not be quite as durable as the original Robohand, it is pretty amazing. Moreover, Michael Curry’s version demonstrates the power of 3D printing and the 3D printing community who work together to make lives a little better. You can check it out on Thingiverse.

“The goal of this is to be a point of departure for experimentation,” says Michael Curry. “I want to see designers create better, more ambitious Robohands.” Check your local listings for the show’s airtime on a NPR station near you.

Birds need houses, and you, the 3D printing community, can be the ones to help. Enter the Thingiverse Birdhouse Challenge by designing a creative and functional birdhouse to shelter the newly-hatched!

PRIZES | First Place Prize: One Eggbot, the open-source art robot that lets you draw on spherical or egg-shaped objects. The winner will also receive a spool of True Black MakerBot PLA filament. The winning design will be featured on Thingiverse and the MakerBot Blog, as well as printed out and displayed in the MakerBot store at 298 Mulberry St. in NYC. Second Place Prize: A spool of True Blue MakerBot PLA filament. Third Place Prize: A spool of True Red MakerBot PLA filament.

TIME OF CHALLENGE | Thirty days. Monday, June 17 through Tuesday, July 16 at 11:59 PM ET. We will announce the winning entry on the MakerBot Blog on Friday, July 19!

HOW | You upload a design for your unique birdhouse and the printing instructions to Thingiverse. Tag each of your entries with “Birdhouse.” Once you’ve uploaded, encourage others to like and make your design.

JUDGING | Our panel of judges will subjectively pick a winning design based on functionality, printability and creativity. Enter as many designs as you want! A first place, second place, and third place winner will be selected. Get started with Thingiverse today. The race is officially on!

Please read the OFFICIAL RULES.

The MakerBot Replicator 2 is coming to Amazon.com! MakerBot Desktop 3D Printers will now be available on Amazon’s recently launched online 3D printing store. As an official reseller of MakerBot Desktop 3D Printers, Amazon will offer a limited number of the top-selling 3D printers later this month.

We are excited to see Amazon embracing 3D printing and devoting an online store to the technology.  To learn more, click here.

NEW TO THE FAMILY
You’ve asked for them, and now they are here. Introducing MakerBot’s True Blue, True Black, and True Purple PLA Filament. We have loaded these colors into the Replicator 2s in our office, and the results are gorgeous.

We love PLA for the MakerBot Replicator 2 because it is luscious to work with. It performs well with minimal peeling, curling or shrinking; it’s an environmentally friendly, renewable bioplastic made from corn; and it smells nice! Our entire Filament library is now fully stocked, with no lead time on shipping. Take a look and order today.

VOTE!
Since the MakerBot Replicator 2 Desktop 3D Printer launched last September, requests for new Filament colors have gone through the roof.  We’re developing a range of new colors to meet this demand and want to hear from you! Cast a vote for the colors you want to see, and we’ll follow your lead. Happy 3D printing.

We’ve grown a lot through many inflection points in the past 4 1/2 years as we’ve transformed from a small garage-built project into a 274 person innovation company in Brooklyn. From the beginning we have been dedicated to building tools that empower people to unleash their creativity. We’re growing really fast right now and so I recently sat down with my leadership team to take a snapshot of the way we work now as we evolve. “The MakerBot Way” is what we came up with and it embodies the spirit of the way we work at MakerBot.

In order to continually optimize the MakerBot Digitizer Desktop 3D Scanner, the MakerBot team tests objects to see the results. We found a feline friend at our thrift store trip last week, and decided to take him on a journey through our 3D scanning workflow.

STEP 1: FIND YOUR OBJECT
The first step in scanning an object is finding an object with the right specs to scan well. This friendly feline has a matte texture that is perfect for scanning, as glossy surfaces can overexpose the camera’s light sensor, making surfaces difficult to capture.

STEP 2: DIGITIZE YOUR OBJECT
Our cat fit within Digitizer Desktop 3D Scanner’s size parameters, as it can scan objects up to the size of an 8″ by 8″ cylinder.

STEP 3: PRINT YOUR OBJECT
At last, we can print our 3D object on a MakerBot Replicator 2 Desktop 3D Printer. There are many ways to scan a cat, but the best option is with the MakerBot Digitizer 3D Scanner.

OPTIONAL: REFINE YOUR OBJECT
The advantage of 3D scanning an object is the ability to spend your time tweaking a design instead of starting from scratch. If we weren’t in such a rush to show off our scan to the MakerBot community, we would’ve refined our model by adding more texture, or increasing the level of detail on the cat’s tail. Softwares like Autodesk’s Mudbox or 123D can be used to refine your design.

When French entrepreneurs Stephane Madoeuf and Victor Martin heard that newly elected President Francois Hollande had proposed raising capital gains tax by more than 30%, the duo decided to use their MakerBot Replicator 2 Desktop 3D Printer to join other protesters known as “les pigeons,” a French expression for “the fools.”  Stephane and Victor launched a website to sell 3D printed pigeons, http://printapigeon.com, offering a two-for-one deal: one pigeon for the purchaser, and one mailed directly to President Hollande.

The tax project was scrapped, and at the end of April, President Hollande extended an olive branch to entrepreneurs by proposing a 65% reduction in capital gains tax for French entrepreneurs. Vive Le MakerBot!

Want to share your own MakerBot Replicator 2 story for a chance to win $250? Find out how here.

MakerWare 2.2.0 is now available for download. This powerful software is your go-to tool for translating 3D designs to printed objects, and an integral part of the MakerBot 3D Ecosystem. Here is a behind-the-scenes look at the major improvements we’ve made to the MakerBot Slicer, our slicing engine, with this release.

We have improved support material for objects with overhangs. We have all new rafts that are easy to detach. We have better handling of narrow features, new infill patterns (cats included), and so much more. Let’s dive in:

IMPROVED SUPPORT
Meet Laurana, a 3D printed version of a bust by Italian Renaissance sculptor Francesco Laurana. In the pictures that follow, you’ll see support structures generated using the old version of the MakerWare 2.1.0 (left), and how this has been improved in the new release, MakerWare 2.2.0(right). Support structures are extruded materials that MakerWare can add to a 3D model in order to reinforce objects with overhangs. For example, Laurana’s Romanesque nose would droop under its own weight without support material. The new version of MakerWare is much smarter about generating supports only where they are needed. We’ve also changed the pattern of support material, so it’s much easier to break away. Objects use less plastic and print faster than ever.

IMPROVED RAFTS
We’ve also equipped MakerWare 2.2.0 with improved rafts. A raft is a thin foundation of extruded material that helps your object stick to the build plate during a print, keeping it level and secure. Our new rafts detach more easily, creating a smoother bottom surface. We printed a gear bearing to show how well our new rafts print on objects with detailed first layers.

IMPROVED  NARROW FEATURE HANDLING
Previous versions of MakerWare occasionally missed details on thin or narrow features. Not anymore: MakerWare 2.2.0 offers the best handling of narrow features. Below, you can see how the new version of MakerWare seamlessly printed a single-walled bracelet.

NEXT WEEK: NEW INFILL PATTERNS AND MORE
We’ll be highlighting additional new features from MakerWare 2.2.0 next week, including new infill patterns like the “catfill” pattern featured in the picture below. In order to turn on cat-shaped infill, just create a custom MakerBot Slicer profile and change the “sparseInfillPattern” setting from “hexagonal” to “catfill”.

We’ve also released Firmware 7.3.0 today. It contains a few improvements and bug fixes, including an automatic pause for changing filament colors during a print.

Stay tuned for updates, and be sure to download the full release today. We’d love to see how MakerWare 2.2.0 improves the way you print, so send us your before and after photos and any feedback to [email protected]

Click below to see the full MakerWare and and firmware release notes.

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